Tuesday, 10 June 2008

• God Met Me in the Midst of Drugs, Alcohol and Witchcraft

  from leslieann4908
  
  In October this year it will be 6 years to the day I turned my life over to the Lord. Back then it was a mess! Let met tell you how I got here.

  I was born and raised a good Catholic girl. As a child, I went with my family to church on the major holidays like Easter and Christmas and also during the not so major  holidays like Mother's Day and Father's Day. I spent most Sundays on my daddy's lap watching whatever sport was big that season...I was definitely a "daddy's girl." We were a happy little family who had family vacations and family nights.

  At the age of 8 my parents got separated and all that stopped.

  My dad kinda fell off the face of the earth. He didn't help us financially either, so my mom got two jobs. Since she was never at home, we didn't go to church. I grew up fast and raised my little sister.

  My parents finalized their divorce when I ws 13. My sister and I moved in with my grandparents because my mom was too big of a mess to take care of us. I got back into to church and did all the stuff I was supposed to do as a good little Catholic girl.

  My life started to fall apart after my grandma died during my senior year of high school. I started college and fell into the music major party crowd. I had a ton of "friends," I was drunk a lot, and I entered some unhealthy relationships.  

  I got sucked into paganism (worshiping multiple gods) and found myself a part of a coven just thirty miles north of home. It was a place I felt accepted, wanted and important. By the age of 23, I was drinking, drugging, and looking for "love" in all the wrong places. Looking back, it's amazing that I didn't flunk out of college.

  At the age of 25, I found myself bored with where the routine of feeling unloved, and unhappy, of wanting to die and being unsuccessful. Some friends from school kept inviting me to a college group that met on Friday nights at their church, and although I'd started to wonder if there was a God, I couldn't go even if I wanted to because I worked the night shift at my job.

  As I was driving one of those friends home one day, he asked me, "Leslie, do you think when you die you'll go to heaven?" I said, "Yea, I think so." He said, "Why do you think so?" I said, "Because I'm a good person." He told me that just because I'm good doesn't mean that I am gonna go to heaven and that the only way to heaven is through Jesus Christ. After I dropped him off I was livid! Why would he ask me a question like that?!?! He had hurt my feelings.

  The next day he once again invited me to church that Friday. He said, "Come once, If you don't like it, you don't ever have to come again." I told him I would see what I could do. At my job they didn't like to give you time off, so if I wanted it, I'd have to use (PTO) Paid time off. I was working for a call center at the time and when I got to work that evening they told us that we would have Fridays off for the next month due to low call volume. I sat at my cubicle in aw for a moment and then went and called my friend.
  
  Friday came and I went to the church. There were people I knew from school, which was cool. It atmosphere felt comfortable and the Christians that I assumed would be fake,  rude and stupid were the nicest people I'd ever met. I left that night knowing that I would visit again. I didn't go to church that Sunday even thought I wanted to because I got scared last minute. The following Friday, I went back and my new friends encouraged me to attend on Sunday. They offered to sit with me so I wouldn't feel so alone.

  Sunday came and church was unreal...

  The pastor said that God knew I would be there that day and that He wanted me to know that He loved me no matter what I'd done or seen! He explained that God had sent His son Jesus to die for MY sins so that I could one day be with God in heaven. I couldn't quite understand that. As a child, I was taught that I couldn't go to heaven I'd done bad things. I gave my life to the Lord that day and itchanged almost immediately. I stopped drinking, doing drugs, renounced the witchcraft stuff and stopped sleeping around. The cussing even stopped.

  God met me right where I was and helped me turn my life around

  I began attending church regularly and then started singing on the worship team. My friend from school had told the worship pastor that I could sing, so he gave me a solo without even hearing what I sound like. Bringing people into God's presence through music is now one my passions as God continues to use me as part of that team. 
  Over the past two years, God has brought me to a place where I needed to work through some of the hurts, habits and hang-ups in my life. Our church began a program called Celebrate Recovery. Through this program, I've found emotional healing for the harmful parts of my life. I've found that some of the things I was doing to "medicate" the pain (like drinking, drugging and men) were only symptoms of other hurts. I went through my 12 steps and am now a part of the leadership for this program at our church. Another one of my passions is to help women find healing through Jesus Christ. I love watching them make decisions for Christ, for their families and for themselves.

  I'm also on full-time staff at my church. I thank God for taking me out of a place I really could call hell. *Phew*

  
   

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